New South Wales Rural Fire Service Deputy Commissioner, Rob Rogers, explains today's fire situation, the strategies and tactics applied to the extreme fire threat on Wednesday and answers questions on the RFS report into the cause of the State Mine Fire near Lithgow.

As bushfire conditions show signs of easing overnight for firefighters battling blazes in the Blue Moutains and Southern Highlands, New South Wales Rural Fire Service Deputy Commissioner Rob Rogers says it's not over yet.

As ABC News reports, while several major fires have been recently downgraded from emergency warning status to Watch and Act, the NSW Rural Fire Service is urging the public not be complacent about the ongoing threat to affected communities.

Three fires burning in the Blue Mountains and one fire burning in the Southern Highlands are at Watch and Act status, including the State Mine Fire near Lithgow, the Mount Yorke Mt Victoria fire, the Linksview Road fire (Springwood) and the Hall Road fire affecting the Southern Highlands.

Further north, a Watch and Act alert is current for the Gateshead fire at Lake Macquarie.

A total fire ban applies to the Greater Sydney, Greater Hunter, Central Ranges and Illawarra/Shoalhaven districts until further notice.

Mr Rogers told 702 Breakfast that managing the fire threat wasn't over, despite being in a "better place than we've been before".

"The message is, the job's not finished but we're in a lot better position than we were...the strategies have been very, very aggressive," he said.

Mr Rogers said yesterday's management of the fire threat had involved co-ordinated arrangements between various emergency bodies and other agencies.

"This is one of these things where there's no single person, agency, that makes it all happen.

"It's such a collection of people that come together, which I think is one of the unique things about Australians - they absolutely pull together during these sort of times to support the common effort."

Asked about changing role of technology in assisting emergency management over the years, Mr Rogers highlighted systems and devices that had been used during the fire events over the last week.

"What we have now is a situation with video cameras on helicopters getting live footage of what's going on, we can beam that straight to the incident management team, to the people making the decisions so they can actually see that.

"What happens is, a firefighter on the ground who's running that part of it, they see one part of the fire, they don't necessarily see all of it which is always a problem for all of us in the fire fighting game.

"This enables incident managers, the person managing that fire to make decisions based on what community is going to be at threat. They can see how fast that fire is moving.

Mr Rogers said the line scan plane, which hovers around 20,000ft also meant technology was able to map the location of fires and their intensity.

Mr Rogers also commented on the text message alert system that he said had helped inform fire affected communities of the relevant threat.

"I was so surprised, pleasantly surprised, because I was very fearful when we lost all those homes in Springwood and Winmalee that there would have been fatalities."

"I was really fearful and for that not to happen, was obviously great work from firefighters on the ground but also a testament to the fact of the alert put out that people knew what was going on."

Mr Rogers acknowledged the partnership with media in helping alert people to the various emergency situations that had unfolded.

He stressed that clear communication was of upmost importance.

"One of the lessons that all the fire agencies around the country learned after the Victorian experience was, we have to be fairly plain and clear in our language and make sure we tell it as we see it.

"The risk yesterday was huge, honestly, it was the biggest risk we had but we put in place all these strategies to try and make it not happen.

"As long as people understand that the fact that it didn't happen was because of the good work that went on, not because we decided to elevate a risk that wasn't there - because it certainly was."

Mr Rogers said he didn't have any information to discuss and said he was not in a position to judge whether or not appropriate safety mechanisms had been carried out at the Marrangaroo Training Area, where it's reported that a live ordinance exercise was taking place.

A total fire ban had not been issued for the area on that day.

"All I would say is, there's a range of activities that cause fires. There's obviously all the natural ones but even the manmade ones, we have people that use angle grinders, doing welding."

"I think the fact is we've done our roles to do fire investigation and determine the cause and origin of that fire, which is what we've now done."

Mr Rogers said the report had been given to police, will be sent to Defence, and considered from there.

"There is carelessness and there's actually accidents. I'm not in a position to say which one there is but people should just remember that sometimes, through the best of intentions, things go wrong and maybe that's one of these things - I don't know. "

Discussing yesterday's conditions and the morale of the firefighters, Mr Rogers said while crews were tired, spirits were high and the support of interstate colleagues had provided a "big uplift".

"I think it's just one of those things where everyone comes together, they're tired but determined."

Hear the full interview with RFS Deputy Commissioner Rob Rogers by locating the audio to the right.